Shingleton Life & Times: Summer Edition

Last week, I went out to dinner with a girlfriend at a chichi upscale eatery here in OKC. It was beautiful weather and the hostess asked if we’d like to sit outside. Why yes, we would, thankssomuch. So we sat and drank iced teas and enjoyed the gorgeous night. The restaurant was packed — and at one point I hopped up to run to the restroom, where I then saw another friend. I chatted with this friend for about 10 minutes before I ran back outside to our table. And the second I sat down, I started to tilt – I realized one leg of the chair was off of the concrete and into the flowerbed, and it was like slow motion. It was like 4 years passed in the space of 1 second. I reached out for the table, but it was so lightweight it started to come down with me. Susan grabbed the table to keep it and its contents from falling over, but it was like there was no way I could right myself without landing in an ungraceful heap in the bushes.

Did I mention I was wearing a somewhat short-ish skirt? Yeah. And with my loss of balance, my legs splayed out in what can only be described as The Undignified Position One Takes Whilst Receiving A Pap Smear.

AND THEN, the gentleman at the table immediately next to us leaps up out of his chair and had to forcefully heave me up, while, again, the childbirthing bits were still on full display in granny undie splendor humiliation. I was briefly grateful that I’ve been doing Weight Watchers so that I didn’t wear nearly 30 pounds more in this exact moment. I could not even make eye contact with this poor (probably scarred) man.

But (possibly?) the worst part was not the fact that the whole thing even happened. It was then that we had to sit there and continue on with the meal AS IF NOTHING EVEN HAPPENED HERE, PEOPLE. As if the entire patio crowd did not just discover that yes, I was in fact wearing Granny Panties. And all I could think was “Thank goodness we were drinking iced tea because surely everyone thought I was toasted.”

So the lesson of this story is twofold: (1) ALWAYS WEAR UNDERWEAR, Internet. And (2) your mother is right – always put on clean underwear because OMG WHAT IF YOU WERE IN A CAR WRECK OR ON AN UNSTEADY CHAIR NEAR A RECEDING LEDGE.

And to round out the night, I came home to the sink being totally plugged up and the garbage disposal broken. We had a lake pooled underneath our kitchen cabinets, and leaking into the trash that sits next to it. SEND HELP.

In other news, this weekend Jude left for camp, which neither Simon or I ever did at this age. At this particular camp, everyone shows up with actual legit trunks, which threw me for a loop. I mean, the darn thing weighs like 50 pounds empty. So we’ve had this giant piece of furniture sitting in the living room where I fastidiously labeled errrthang. And I’m going to assume that he wears the same pair of underwear all week, never brushes his teeth, and basically comes home a filthy mess, full of great stories of all the basketball he played.

He was a little bit nervous about riding the bus up to camp five hours away and to be honest, I was just a teeny bit too. But! I had decided that it was silly for us to drive him up there, turn around to drive back and then have to do it all over again next week when we pick him up and that he would survive taking the bus AND it would force him to make new friends. So I’ve been checking the camp photo site religiously to find evidence that he is, in fact, there. And yes, it appears he is having a gloriously fab time.

Meanwhile, Archer is telling everyone who will listen to him that Ju-Ju is at camp, and he rode on a schoolbus to get there. He’s flyin’ high, being the only child for the week and is already reveling in the nonstop attention (although who are we kidding – he’s a demanding toddler. He ALWAYS gets all the attention). On Saturday evening, we took food over to a friend’s house who’s been out of town, and they have a big pet rabbit who lopes around the kitchen. Archer nearly lost his mind when he saw the rabbit (who, to be fair, is almost the same size he is). “WABBIT! I SKEERED! ARCHER SKEERED OF WABBIT!” Bless it.

Earlier last week I was invited to Hobby Lobby with a couple other bloggers to be filmed styling a few scenes. I’ll have the video to share around in the next week, but it was fun to go explore their corporate HQ here in Oklahoma City. They have over 9 million (!) square feet and that includes a full-size mockup of an actual HL store within their HQ. Pretty amazing – and a little bit unsettling as it felt like there should be a bunch of shoppers in there with us! Everything was set up to show what the stores will look like 6 months from now. Lots of fun art and decor items coming our way.

Ok, I’m off to tackle my gigantic list of things to get done before Jude comes home from camp. Wish me luck!